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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/28972620">Little One</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/RockyPond/pseuds/RockyPond'>RockyPond</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Minecraft (Video Game), Video Blogging RPF</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Canonical Character Death, Character Death, Death as a character, Dialogue Light, Gen, Ghost Wilbur Soot, Grim Reapers, Introspection, It's Death, Major character death - Freeform, Minor Character Death, Omnipotence, Omnipotent narrator, POV First Person, Wilbur Soot and Technoblade and TommyInnit are Siblings, Wilbur Soot gets another parent</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-01-25</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-01-25</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-13 07:53:34</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Major Character Death</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>3,228</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/28972620</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/RockyPond/pseuds/RockyPond</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>He looked me in the eyes and smiled. Very few see me and smile, and in that moment, I felt this boy wrap a tight grip around my heart and refuse to let go.<br/>“Hello.”<br/>“Hello little one.”<br/>I first came for Wilbur Soot when he was a young boy. And yet, this boy defied reasoning once again. First, he lived, and then he looked at me and smiled.</p><p>-</p><p>Wilbur Soot defies Death as a small child and quickly becomes Death's 'Little One'. It's not a helpful position, because Death must still come for him, but it does cause Death to think a lot about this small boy and what he becomes.<br/>An introspection piece of Death, as they take the souls of Wilbur and his friends, time and again, and think about the fate of their little one and the fate of this world.</p><p>-</p><p>"Forget the Scythe, goddamn it. I needed a broom, or a mop. And I needed a vacation." - The Book Thief</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>6</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>76</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Little One</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>I started thinking about the character of Death in the Book Thief last night, and it got me thinking about the role of Death (not the same character as the Boom Thief, this is a different version of the concept of Death as a person) within the DreamSMP, how lonely that experience would be. And then it got me thinking about Wilbur Soot, who seems to be followed by death more than any of the other characters. Then, I started writing.<br/>ALSO, to clear up any confusion on how deaths work in this world; you have 'respawns' which are infinite. They are deaths that wouldn't be viewed as 'canon' in the SMP, like mob deaths or not important battles between characters. However, sometimes Death will come for you and reap your soul, with the canon deaths. These are the ones that count, and you only have three of them. No one knows which deaths will result in their souls being reaped, so most people are careful around dying. Others, not so much.</p><p>TW for death (all canonical), injury and at one point somewhat of a graphic description of the firework execution of Tubbo (and Schlatt and Quackity accidentally). Also, just general existentialism, this is written from the perspective of someone who will see everything end one day after all.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>I first came for Wilbur Soot when he was a small boy. Barely 7 or 8, he had taken a tumble into the freezing cold river, clothes carrying him down to an early encounter with Death. I was meant to take him in that moment, but another small hand reached out, wrapping around a frozen arm, joined by another, larger one.</p><p>They pulled the boy up onto the shore and pushed hard against his chest until water flowed past his lips. That wasn’t meant to happen, Wilbur Soot was meant to die his first death in that river and yet the little child kept breathing.</p><p>I remained by his bedside well into the night, waiting for the time when his lungs would still and I’d take his first life. But that never came. Instead, he lay by the fire, his family having slipped down into sleep.</p><p>He looked me in the eyes and <em>smiled.</em> Very few see me and smile, and in that moment, I felt this boy wrap a tight grip around my heart and refuse to let go. “Hello.”</p><p>“Hello little one.” I spoke, confused. I had never spoken out loud before, I had never had reason to. And yet, this boy defied reasoning once again. First, he lived, and then he looked at me and smiled.</p><p>I wonder if that moment, that moment when I spoke back, planted myself in his mind so firmly, was what set him off down his path. Whether his future actions were a simple invitation for another conversation, for a dance with me. Was he always meant to carry Death along with him, or had I cursed him with those three words?</p><p>Wilbur Soot did not deserve my curse.</p><p> </p><p>My little one’s brother kept me very busy.</p><p>The piglin boy had a taste for blood matched by very few. I could not bring myself to hate the young child however, not when he brought me closer to my little one each time he drew his sword against the exposed flesh of another’s body.</p><p>When I came to reap the souls of those who lost to the piglin boy, I would remain and linger. After all, Technoblade could always be expected to pick another fight, it was only responsible for me to follow him all the way home until the journey’s end.</p><p>And once he reached the home, if I sat and watched my little one play, then no one could stop me. If I was to be surrounded by blood and gore for my entire pitiful existence, I demanded compensation in the form of the living’s joy. To sit and watch is my reward.</p><p> </p><p>It was always meant to be.</p><p>This dark, obsidian room was always meant to be the resting place of these revolutionaries, I was always meant to pass through those cold walls and cross through the massacre.</p><p>My heart ached to see my little one amongst the disaster, betrayed by his friend. His brother, ally and son’s bodies soon followed, and I knew I could not wait. I had to reap their souls fast, allow them to return to their ridiculous wars and flights of fancy.</p><p>What is Death to do with war except do their job and wait for it to be over?</p><p>I quickly sent Tommy and Tubbo back, taking their young souls with guilt. Children were always difficult to reap, their little cries and fearful expressions pressing down upon my chest. I needed this war to be over.</p><p>My little one’s little one came next, and I sent him along into his next life. He was so very small, his fur matted as he lay there bleeding. I averted my eyes and wished for this war to be over.</p><p>My little one was left for last, and I realised with a start this was my first time taking one of his lives, after that fateful day so many years ago when the river failed to break his spirit. He stared me down, and just as I felt the urge to curse him out and demand he end his war, provide me my peace that I wanted so badly even if it meant I could not meet my little one again until he was old and grey, he smiled at me.</p><p>“Hello.”</p><p>“Hello little one.”</p><p>My heart broke as I reaped his soul, already so tattered and stained with blood. I could not bear to see him go and I could not bear to see him smile.</p><p> </p><p>I came for the soul of Tommy for the second time as he lay in a freezing cold river.</p><p>I stared down at his small face, contorted in pain as his little hands reached up shaking for the arrow that stuck out of his chest. I cringed as the blonde child coughed, blood spattering from his lips. His older brother, my little one, was holding him now, knees deep in the water as he muttered meaningless words of comfort.</p><p>I did not want to take Tommy’s soul. He was a brave boy, filled with life and chaos and it felt wrong to watch his chest slowly grow still.</p><p>I looked at his soul, curled up in pain. I went to lean forward, to grab hold of his arm and send him on his way, but he flinched back. The fear on his face morphed quicker than I could fully comprehend, until it evolved into pure rage and anger as he stared at the green hooded man across the river, who was smirking at the body of the young boy. I was once again struck by humanity's ability to be cruel.</p><p>The look on Tommy’s face changed one final time, a steely resolve taking hold and he nodded at me, fear all gone, thrusting out an arm for me to take. I knew he would work to end the war, at all costs. I found myself smiling at the brave boy, proud of his strength.</p><p>He did not smile back.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p>My little one was racing through the forest, ducking under branches and jumping over tree roots. It reminded me of his little games as a child, when he would run away and hide from his brothers, but this was no simple game.</p><p>He was being forced away, ripped from his own home by someone he had once viewed as a friend. I had kept an invisible vigil over the games him and Schlatt had once played, watching, smiling, when the two would push each other into water or lava, playing a dangerous game of cat and mouse with me.</p><p>I had never been sure Schlatt’s motivation in those moments, maybe simply wanting some danger in his previously uneventful life, but Wilbur’s had been clear. He wanted to see me, even if it meant wasting one of his precious lives to do so.</p><p>Thankfully, none of those deaths had been true ones, the gods above seeming to recognise them as what they were, simply two boys playing around, toeing the line recklessly. And yet I watched, as my little one had smiled and run around, chasing after his friend.</p><p>He was not smiling now.</p><p>Instead, he kept running, even as arrows flew past his weaving body. I knew what was coming, and I sensed he did too as he looked not through me but at me. Our eyes made contact, just as the arrow pierced through his lung, and I reached forward, slowing his fall until he rested on the forest floor.</p><p>“Hello.”</p><p>“Hello little one.”</p><p>His frustrated and betrayed face gave way for his blinding smile, and I found myself in wonder at this boy once again. My little one, who despite his pain and fear, was always willing to offer me a smile. My heart broke for him, even as I quickly reaped his soul and sent him on his way. He needed to come back quickly, to protect his younger brother, who we both knew only had one last visit from me left.</p><p> </p><p>I came for Tubbo’s second life in a burst of colour. Despite myself, I looked around at the beauty of this death, sparks floating around the boy’s burnt body. I wished to take his pain, give him one last look at the colours before he would go, unmarred by the burning, but I knew I could not.</p><p>He suffered in his final moments, and I was left wondering how something could be so cruel and so beautiful at the same time.</p><p>I ignored the presence of the piglin boy behind me. In the past, where his antics had left me tired but thankful, now it just filled me with a simple dread. I knew he was turning around, shooting into the crowd, but I could tell these were simple respawn deaths, not needing my reapings.</p><p>Unlike the boy in front of me, and the two men who lay further up the stage, reds and blues still swarming their prone and burnt forms. The smell of it made my nose wrinkle and I quickly sent Tubbo’s little soul away, wishing to spare him as much pain and suffering as possible. I left the two men for the time being, of course I would have to reap their souls soon, but as they cried out, writhing in pain, I felt something sick and twisted curl up within me. I let them cry.</p><p>I could be oh so kind, and I could be oh so cruel, much like the humanity that had always confused me. In this moment, I understood them.</p><p>Looking out from the stage, I saw my little one stood in the crowd, about to turn and flee. I knew deep down that he could have stopped this, in the way I knew everything that had passed and was soon to follow. My little one had let this happen.</p><p>I was unsure why, whether it was simply his mind playing vengeful tricks on him, or perhaps a sick need to see me again, without his own life in danger, but he stared me down, even as his younger brother pulled at his arm and screamed profanities in his ear.</p><p>He smiled at me.</p><p>I wish he had not, I wish I could not see the twisted movement of his lips, how something dangerous and cruel had taken a hold of what used to be a comfort and left it something sharp and painful. I wished that my little one did not have a smile for me in that moment, and yet he did.</p><p> </p><p>My little one hurt me oh so dearly.</p><p>He lay there crumbled in his father’s arms, smoke and feathers drifting in the stiff air around their portrait of misery.</p><p>I wished to brush the hair away from his eyes, to wipe the sweat from his brow and clean the blood from his chest.</p><p>I could do none of these things.</p><p>Instead, I stood there to reap his soul one final time.</p><p>His breath had long since ceased, and I was sure if I were capable of tears, I would be crying along with his father. The man so many humans had called ‘the Angel of Death.’ In truth, Philza Minecraft was as human as the rest of them, fragile and breakable, and I would come for him for the last time eventually.</p><p>In truth, I have never liked that title to begin with, no matter who it was applied to.</p><p>In truth, I was no angel.</p><p>My little one blinked up at me, and I gave him my hand, which he accepted, his grip finding my own. He was so very tall and yet so small in front of me. I pretended not to know this would be the last time I saw him.</p><p>He smiled.</p><p>I last came for Wilbur Soot when he was a young man, bleeding out in a cold, stone room. I could not bear to see him smile.</p><p>“Goodbye.”</p><p>“Goodbye little one.”</p><p> </p><p>I did not say my true final goodbyes that day, despite knowing I should have. Instead, my grief and anguish and anger twisted and distorted him, taking a hold of his soul before I could fully comprehend what was happening.</p><p>This was not the first time my little one had defied me, and it was surprisingly not the last. I knew I was to blame for this one, but I could not find it in me to care, staring down in joy at his grey face. He looked like me now, my little one. Devoid of colour, except for his bright yellow sweater, that looked so similar to what he wore the first time we met.</p><p>I smiled for him, and he smiled back, but there was something wrong. This was not his peaceful and joyful smile that had drawn me to him, nor his twisted one that had sent shivers down my spine for days on end. It was hollow and vacant, a simulacrum of something long since passed.</p><p>This was not my little one, not truly. All of the rough edges had been smoothed away, and the echo in his voice did not ring out beautifully across the world, instead it left a pit in what should have been my stomach, an empty vacuum in the space that would have housed my heart if I had been blessed with humanity, if I had not been Death.</p><p>Despite the wrongness of this all, I still found comfort in his presence. It was a terrible replication, a shade of my little one that paled in comparison to the deep well of emotions he had once held, but I could not bring myself to care.</p><p>I was selfish.</p><p>He could see me now, any moment of the day or night. Even as I kept a silent vigil over his family and friends, even when I was not meant to be there, simply checking in, his eyes found my own every time.</p><p>“Hello, I’m Ghostbur.” He would always say the same thing, introducing himself as if this weren’t the fiftieth time I had spoken with the spirit. He did not remember me, and each reminder sent a lacing pain through me.</p><p>“Hello, little one.” I would always respond, attempting to imitate, replicate what once was.</p><p>It was never the same, and yet he would always smile for me.</p><p>I pretended not to notice that he smiled for everyone now, that I was not special for my little one anymore. He should not have been special for me; it was my own curse that had led him down this path and I was wrong for allowing it to continue even after I had come and gone for this boy three times.</p><p>I was selfish.</p><p> </p><p>I came for the death of L’Manburg. This country had survived so much, but it could not survive this. The humans could offer empty platitudes as much as they wanted, reassure themselves that L’Manburg was the people, not the physical location, but it hadn’t been the people since its leader had died within its walls, driven mad after being separated from it for too long.</p><p>This country was simply a mirror image of what once was, and I was thankful to see it shatter.</p><p>My little one’s mirror was sobbing, screaming in its depths, with no amount of blue able to quell the anguish he was feeling. I stood by, still and tall as he begged for Friend to show himself, to be okay. I stood by, still and tall, as he yelled at his father, the supposed ‘angel of death’. And I stood by, still and tall, as he made his decision that he needed to be resurrected.</p><p>I knew it was selfish, but I was pleased to hear this news, to know that soon my little one would be back, properly and fully. I had grown cold towards this spirit, cruel and vicious. I had even found myself praying for rain, when he would turn to look at me, so that I did not need to see his false smile.</p><p>This was my punishment, I knew, for growing attached. The gods above did not like me, and they sought to rip away everything I held so dear, but I would not let them. I had been here before even they had formed, and I would be here long after they had ceased. It was but a simple waiting game for me, and I would pass my time however I damn well pleased.</p><p>And that included bringing back my little one, no matter what the gods wanted.</p><p> </p><p>He was back, not yet whole but getting there. He did not yet have a physical form, but he still continued to bicker with his brother, his voice bellowing out towards the younger boy.</p><p>He would form soon, I assumed. I did not know for certain.</p><p>My little one was out of my grasp now; I did not know how this would all work. Would I have to come for him again, at some point? Maybe three times, as if his soul count had been reset. Or maybe he would now be immune to even me, walking the universe along beside me, no longer my little one but my equal.</p><p>I did not know what would become of my little one, could not see his future. I knew the fates of every living creature in this land, from the bees young Tubbo loved so much, to the final deaths that would befall my little one’s brothers eventually, even the gods ultimate fates were known only to me. But I did not know his fate.</p><p>Despite this, I smiled as his voice drifted along the air, and I knew that even when lacking in a physical form, he was smiling for me.</p><p> </p><p>After the final deaths of all who had once filled the Dream SMP had come and gone, I found myself walking its plains and fields, its forests and rivers, its mountains and ravines. I had other realms to visit, of course I did, and I did not shirk my duties.</p><p>But when I had a moment’s spare, I would come here, staring out at where movement had once been plentiful, but now there was nothing.</p><p>This was the ultimate fate of everything, every universe and realm. One day they would all be like this, empty and ghost towns without any spirits. Just silent and still.</p><p>There was movement this time however, and I looked out across the way, and there, stood beneath a simple tree, was my little one.</p><p>I did not know how it was possible, but I did not care. Maybe the gods had taken pity on my soul, or maybe I had brought this forth myself, or maybe Wilbur Soot’s soul had just found a good enough reason to hold on past the death of everything, but my little one stood before me.</p><p>I rushed forward, feet trampling over grass that had once held a battlefield. Eventually, everything ended, even wars. Now, it was simply a graveyard, a cemetery of memories.</p><p>I stopped before my little one, fearful that one touch would send him away, like I was so used to, but he moved first. He wrapped his arms around me, and he did not disappear under my hand. He stayed there, solid and beautiful.</p><p>“Hello.”</p><p>“Hello little one.”</p><p>
  <em>And he smiled.</em>
</p><p> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>I hope you enjoyed. I don't usually write in the first person, but it felt right for this story. I also love writing very ramble-y stories, with thoughts that flow from one to the other, and I think it worked well for Death, so I hope it was fun to read and not boring or annoying.<br/>If you have any questions about this character of Death please ask away, because I lowkey fell in love with them while writing them, and now i want to talk about them more, even though it's all very self-explanatory.</p></blockquote></div></div>
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